Bloodred
by Physically Inflated
Summary: My name is Erin. I'm here to tell you about the time when everyone was disappearing or dying, and no one knew why... This is the story of the end of my known world and the beginning of a time of fear and a time of war. This is the story of the vampires.
1. PROLOGUE

**Disclaimer: If I owned anything as wonderful as the Twilight universe, why would I waste my time writing fanfiction instead of books? I own nothing... sadly.**

_My room was dark and for some reason cold… I didn't know why. I looked around carefully. Yes, my small heater was still on, emitting a soft glow to indicate that it was. _

_As my eyes adjusted to the rest of the dark room, I found the reason for the cold- my window was wide open, blowing in chilly bursts of wind every few second. A little bit of rain found its way in, too._

_I got up to close it, wrapping my arms around myself. I shivered, and not just from the cold. Why was my window open? I certainly didn't leave it that way. We'd lived in Tacoma for years- no one would be stupid enough to have a window agape in the winter. Of course, the wind was always strong- maybe I'd just forgotten to lock it and the window had been blown open… But my instincts told me that was not quite the case. I snapped it shut with another shudder. My stupid, overactive imagination…_

_I turned around just as the clouds shifted and the moon lit up my room. There were suddenly shadows everywhere, the most important of them being the one from a tall figure standing totally still by my door. My eyes flickered to his face and I stepped back in shock. His eyes were a severe, shocking red and his facial features were gorgeous. His dirty blonde hair fell into his eyes, increasing his look of mystique. _

_I did not have time to focus on the details, because a split second after I lay eyes on him, my breath was gone, knocked from me roughly, and I was over his shoulder. I was confused- what was happening? I was also, of course, terrified, because he was hard and cold and strong and I knew we were not in my room any longer. Wind whipped my hair around so hard that it stung my face, so I snapped my eyes shut. We were obviously going at a speed I was not used to, a speed that _no one_ could be used to._

_I wanted to scream, but I couldn't… I was gasping for breath as it was. _

_I could not get the vision of the eyes out of my mind._

_The dead, bright, horrific eyes._

_The bloodred eyes._

**A/N**

**Just in case you're wondering, this is set sometime around the beginning of Eclipse... When the newborn army was being formed. This story is, in fact, about one of those vampires, so... Yeah. (Wow, that came out lame.) If you don't like it, please just don't read it and don't flame me.**

**And also, this is not the first chapter- this is just the prologue.**

**Thanks,**

**Beth (Physically Inflated)**


	2. Missing

My eyes snapped open. There was a cat on my face.

I was incredibly disoriented for a second. Cat… Beautiful man… Scary eyes… My mother's smirk from the doorway… It all blurred together until I couldn't make sense of it.

I tried to sort it out. After a moment, I categorized everything- Morning: Mom & cat. Dream: Drop-dead gorgeous man & his bloody eyes.

That made a little more sense. My mother laughing at me and the cat on my face were part of my normal morning routine. In order to wake me up, Mom would place a glass of chocolate milk on the small table on the opposite side of my bed. My kitten, Staccato, just happened to _love_ chocolate milk- she would walk across me to get to it, effectively ending my slumber.

I thought about that routine and how I hated it... I was not a morning person.

Because of that, I grumbled a little but hopped out of bed, anyway.

As I walked toward my small bathroom, I tried to understand my dream. It was rare that I would have one that vivid, and ever rarer that I'd remember it. How odd that I would today, of all days- Friday the 13th. I shrugged the thought away... I did my best not to be superstitious.

I hardly had time to worry, though- every morning was a race to get to school, to work hard every day before actual classes even began. My two favorite parts of the day worked in this order- Early-Morning Band, and then Band Class. My flute was one of my best friends. The other was Em. She, at least, was human. Every day, she and I caught a ride with my mom as she went to work and we practiced our difficult audition peices.

I jumped into my mom's old minivan and heaved my book bag in with me. She was grimacing (we were running late) so she sped off toward Em's house. I got out and ran to the door. The door opened just as I raised my hand to knock. Em's mom, Ms. Joan, stood in the doorway, her black hair escaping its ponytail and a panicked look on her face. "Erin," she gasped to me. "Have you seen Em?"

I frowned. "Not since school yesterday."

Ms. Joan sighed and her face went slack. She leaned against the doorway wearily. "She wasn't in her bed this morning."

My frown intensified. "I... I don't know, Ms. Joan."

Ms. Joan looked at me desperately. "She didn't say anything about going anywhere, or-" Her voice broke. "-or running away or something?"

I shook my head. "No, she didn't say anything."

"Oh, well..." She sighed again. "If you hear anything, please, _please_ let us know."

I nodded dejectedly.

"Thank you, Erin," she said, closing the door.

I filled my mom in as we drove to school. I sensed that she was more worried than she let on, but she dismissed it, saying that she probably just crashed at a friend's house.

I was more worried than I said, too. People had been... disappearing lately. They'd just vanish. I hoped fervently that Em was not among the growing numbers.

I went through school in a daze, keeping an eye out for my friend. I saw neither hide nor hair of her all day.

Miserable, I went outside and waited for my mom to get to the school. School was released at 3:15, and my mom was usually there by 3:30. Well, 4:00 came and went, with no sign of my mom. I tried calling her, but no one answered. At 4:30 I called again, and then once more at 4:45. This was _very_ unlike my mom, who loved schedules and deadlines and being on time for everything.

At 5:00, I gave up and started the long walk home. _Where_ was my mom?_ Where_ was Em? I wanted answers, but at the moment, it didn't look like I was going to get any.

At 6:00, I finally got to my house. Mom's car wasn't in the driveway. I was starting to get very worried, but it made no sense to panic now.

I put my bag down on the rail and called Mom again. It rang five times and then I heard the greeting. I left a message informing her that I was at home and wondering where she was. After that, I called Em's house. Ms. Joan answered the phone. She told me sadly that they had heard nothing and I replied that I hadn't, either.

She thanked me again and I hung up the phone. I grabbed my bag again and plopped down onto the couch so I could get to working on my homework.

I finished that in what seemed like seconds. Now I had nothing to take my mind off my mom and my best friend.

For lack of anything better to do, I cleaned Staccato's litterbox, even though it was already clean. I checked my e-mail... My inbox was empty, nothing to reply to or forward or even to delete.

I sighed and turned off the computer. I had made three steps toward the TV when the phone rang. Thinking it was either my mom or someone from Em's house, I bounded to the phone. "Hello?" I asked breathlessly.

"This is Officer Ranold from the Tacoma Police Department." A voice said gruffly. "Is this the Cole residence?"

"Yes," I squeaked. Oh no, oh no, oh no! I could figure up several reasons for the police to call, none of which were pleasant.

"And to whom am I speaking?"

"Erin Cole," I whispered.

"Yes, well, Erin..." The voice sounded sad. "Is there an adult in the house at the moment?"

"No," I answered, forgetting, for a moment, that _I_ was a legal adult.

"How many live in the house?"

"Two," I replied. "Myself... and my mom."

Officer Ranold sighed. "Do you have a vehicle that you could drive up here with, Erin?"

"Yes." We had an old Jeep that was rarely driven.

"I would appreciate it if you would get up here as soon as possible, then."

"OK," I barely managed to say.

I heard the dial tone. My thoughts were racing a hundred miles an hour in that moment.

What was going on?

* * *

**A/N-**

**Alright, this chapter was NOT my best work, but it's the best I can do for now. Does that make any sense? And I would have gotten this up earlier, but when I finished it, it was 9/11, and I felt like that needed some respect. Then all after that we were getting new floors and new furniture and all sorts of fun stuff like that and I just didn't get a chance.**

**Now, I'm done with the excuses.**

**Forgive me if this chapter was a little confusing and ended on a cliffie, but it's necessary. Yes, it is- don't give me that look!**

**And thank you to the two people who reviewed!! I give you each a virtual teddy bear for your efforts! **

**Sincerely,**

**Beth (Physically Inflated)**


	3. Dead

* * *

I pulled into the police station parking lot, sweating nervously. What could they need _me _for? I reminded myself that they hadn't asked for me, just an adult. This could be nothing at all, it could all be my imagination. I could not shove off the feeling, though, that something bad was going to happen. Maybe it was because I couldn't find my mom, and my friend couldn't be found either. Maybe it was because today was Friday the 13th. Maybe it was because of the dream I'd had last night.

Regardless of the reason, the effect was butterflies beating on my stomach and my clammy skin shiny with sweat.

I pulled open the door and I saw was the officers, talking quietly in the corner of the room. I could barely make out what they were saying.

"...and it's not just Seattle now!"

"Some are dead, some are..."

"No! Why are they so varied, then?"

I approached them and cleared my throat. The blonde one turned to me with a very sympathetic look on his face.

"Are you Erin Cole?"

I didn't trust myself to speak, so I nodded.

"We need you to identify a body."

"A body?" My voice was an octave higher than usual with fear and stress.

The man nodded.

He motioned for me to follow him through a set of doors and then through another door on a long hall. The second door led into a very small room with one thing in it- a table with something underneath a sheet. My breathing turned to hyperventilating.

The man looked concerned, but he had to do his job. He crossed the small room and pulled back the sheet. My heart stopped. There, on that cold table, looking whiter than paper and very dead, was my mother.

My mouth and my eyes both opened wide in shock. I fell to my knees. No, this could not be happening. I would wake up from this terrible nightmare to Staccato's feet on my nose. No, I refused to believe it. It could not be true, yet something, some small, grieving voice in the back of my head, told me that indeed it was.

I felt a hand on my shoulder. "I'm very sorry."

I looked up at him blankly, still willing myself to awake.

"I know that you're going through a lot at the moment, but I need to know. Is this Amanda Cole?"

I nodded.

"That's all we need for the moment," he told me quietly. "You can go now."

I nodded again and staggered robotically to my feet and out the door. I marched down the hallway and through the double doors and out of the station entirely. I unlocked my car and fell into the driver's seat and sat there for a very long time.

Eventually, I found it in myself to drive home numbly. I parked the car out front and unlocked the door, snapping it behind myself and finding that the house was much emptier than it had been a few hours ago.

I trudged woodenly up the stairs and into my bedroom, collapsing onto my bed at once. Staccato nuzzled me, but for once I ignored her. After a time, she gave up and trotted off.

_Why me?_ I thought sadly. In the span of a day, my entire world had fallen upside down, upsetting everything and leaving nothing the same... Nothing ever _would_ be the same again.

I rolled over and buried my face in my pillow. As soon as I felt the fabric against my eyelids, they got very wet and from there, I cried myself to sleep.

I did not know what time it was when I woke up. It was a little bit too dark to clearly see anything, so I rolled over, willing sleep to take me again.

It was not much later that I came to terms with the fact that I would not be getting any more sleep tonight. I sat up, rubbing my eyes. The dark lumps that were my furniture slowly came into focus, highlighting something that should have been frightening, terrifying even.

It was the man from my dream, standing as stock-still as he had before, but he was by the window this time. I felt a strong sense of deja vu, but I could not bring myself to fear the man. What could he do to me, after all, that would make any difference? My world was quite meaningless at the moment- I doubted that even my beloved flute could cheer me up in the least.

Just to check, though, I discreetly pinched my arm. It hurt.

The man took a deliberate step forward. I stood up to meet him. He looked quite mad at my lack of fear.

Then suddenly, and more quickly than I could comprehend, he was standing over me. I felt a sharp pain on my head and then I knew nothing.

* * *

I could not see anything. All was pitch-black around me. I wondered vaguely why.

I felt like my body was contorted into an odd position, but I couldn't be entirely sure, because I wasn't really focused on that.

No, what interested me more was the voices. Beautiful, soft, melodic voices that felt to my ears like morphine does to a dying body.

They were talking quite close to me, or so it sounded like.

"So," the female voice said critically. "This is what you brought me, Riley?"

A moment of silence met the question.

"She looks a little pathetic, don't you think?"

This time a male voice answered. "We've been watching her for days; she is much fiercer than she appears."

"How did she react when you killed her mother?"

Hesitation was clear in the man's soft voice. "Surprisingly. She went around somewhat normally for a few hours, then she cried herself to sleep."

"And what about her friend? What did she do about the girl's disappearance?"

"Nothing out of the ordinary, except to make a few phone calls."

There was a little bit more silence, then the male spoke again. "Is she suitable for your purposes, or do we need to kill her?"

Talk of that scared me a bit, but I felt something restricting my mouth, so I couldn't protest. Of course, what would I have been able to say in my defence anyway?

The female seemed to deliberate for a moment. "She'll do, but I want better next time, Riley."

"Of course."

A second later, there was a searing, burning pain in my arm.

The last thing I heard before I fell under was the woman's musical voice in my ear. "Welcome to Hell, human."

* * *

**A/N-**

**Woot woot!! I updated twice in one day!! Don't expect it to happen more than this time, though, because I'm a busy person. -sigh- I wish it wasn't so.**

**I realize that this took quite a dark turn. It won't stay this dark, necessarily, but it was the only way I could think of to do this. **

**I hope that this chapter came out alright, because I wrote little snippets of it all day then connected it. If it's hated, though, please don't shout. It hurts my ears.**

**Signing out,**

**Beth (Physically Inflated)**


	4. Heaven?

The pain was such that I was unaware of how it felt. Half of me observed the screaming blonde girl, still bound and gagged on the floor. The other half of me was trapped in there, surrounded by torture but in a small refuge from it. Because of this, I was able to think objectively. What could have occurred to cause this? I could not quite feel my own pain, for which I was grateful, but I was sure that if I could, I would feel like I was being burned from the inside. It may have been entirely my imagination, but I seemed to be able to literally see myself, writhing on the grimy floor. What I saw was that there was nothing physically touching me… No knives, not that they would be capable of such horrendous torture. No guns, nothing beating me, no flames.

So, had I been poisoned? I recalled vaguely learning about snake venom and how it penetrated then infiltrated, eventually cutting off internal defenses and the power to control the body, paralyzing and finally killing.

Yes, I decided. I realized calmly that this meant I had to die… I _would_ die, and soon. I examined myself and came to the conclusion that it didn't matter.

Even though I seemed to have some strange immunization after the initial shock of pain, my body was still obviously going through it. Death would end that, right? On top of that, I was sure that this mind-block had to end at some point. I'd be forced out of my mental hiding place and into the fiery blood. That would surely be unendurable.

And a voice in my head reminded me that everything alive I'd known and loved, with the exception of Staccato, was beyond my reach now. Mom… I couldn't bear to think about her. Em… Em was out of sight but not out of mind. I didn't know where she was or even… No, I couldn't think about that possibility. I had to believe that I'd either die from this and see Mom (the tears I saw on my pained face were now not just from the physical discomfort) or I'd live through this and we'd find Em, alive and happy.

In the second I considered all this, I told the stupid voice to shut its stupid face.

I did not know exactly how long I sat there like that in my own mind, but I began noticing changes. The lava left my fingertips and my toes. I could hear just a little bit now. That was a curious thing. Surely, if death was as close as it was, my senses would fade, but they grew a little stronger as the time passed.

I had no way of knowing how _much_ time passed, just that it _did_ pass.

But even as this all happened, a change for the worse happened, too. My heart was turning up the heat… A lot. I still could not _feel_ it, exactly, but I knew it was happening and I knew that the end was near. I mentally braced myself.

The fire, within what felt like hours to me, pulled itself from everywhere and focused its efforts on turning my chest into nothingness, beyond even ashes.

Then, in a split-second, it was gone. Just completely, mercifully gone. I regained control over my body and I stood up… Or at least I thought I did. I must have already been standing, because 1/83 of a second after I thought about it, I was up. My eyes watched the entire way up, though, not missing any details.

And what details there were! I could see everything very clearly as if before, my eyes were blindfolded and I was now truly opening my eyes and seeing what should have been there before.

Maybe, I decided, I was in Heaven. But where was Mom? I'd hoped she'd be waiting for me. Ah, well… I'd find her soon enough.

I heard footsteps and whirled around. Maybe a minute later, the door opened.

My eyes narrowed when I saw who it was. The beautiful blonde man was _here_? Why?

"Follow me," he said curtly.

I decided it best not to argue. I skipped after him to catch up, as he hadn't stopped to wait. It took me less than half of a second to reach him, even though he was already halfway down the long hall. I guessed that everything worked more quickly in Heaven.

As soon as I was directly behind him, he started speaking. His pace did not change in the least. I found, with a slight awe, that I had absolutely no problem keeping up.

"You're a vampire, Cole." He turned to me to smirk at my incredulous expression, but he did not stop talking. His smirk challenged me to contradict him, but I let him continue for the moment. "The rules are as follows- you _will_ stay with me and the group at all times, unless specifically told otherwise. Hunting is the one exception to that rule, and you will _stay in the appointed city_," he said sternly, suddenly facing me again. I wasn't expecting it, so I walked right past him. I turned back. "Are we clear?" He asked.

I silently shook my head no.

"And why not?" He growled.

"Vampires don't exist," I pointed out matter-of-factly. I started slightly. My voice was musical, and higher by a small margin, and beautiful to hear.

"Don't they?" He retorted. "Look at me. Look at yourself. Look at everyone else here."

His words took a moment to register. Of course I heard voices coming from what sounded like a few feet to my left (through a few walls) and a few feet ahead. I just hadn't... Recognized its importance.

He led me through a dead-bolted door (which I not-so-subtly ogled at) and into a crowd of people. My mind made calculations quickly. There were 24 total. "Cole," was all he said before he left. I heard the bolt click. The 24 in the room stared warily at me. Well, that wasn't entirely correct. 23 were staring warily, one was staring half-hopefully, half with horror. That face stood out from all the rest, not because of the expression, but because of the facial features and the long, black hair. I knew that girl- it was Em.

"Em?"

"Erin?" A small part of my brain noted that her voice sounded just as pretty as mine did at the moment.

There was silence for a moment. "Em!" I shouted and ran toward her. Before I realized I was running, I was there.

**A/N-**

**Mwahaha... I've actually had this chapter for a while... I was just a little too lazy to post it. Yeah, shoot me. But ya can't. Cause I'm a vampire!**

**Ok, Ok, I'll stop. For those of you who are wondering, my straightjacket and asylum admission forms are all coming the mail and should be here soon. Never fear.**

**Anyway, please, _please_ review! I feel so pathetic begging, but I have to know how I've done. And if people don't tell me, I'm not going to know because I'm not talented enough to know all by myself.**

**So, thanks!**

**Beth (Physically Inflated)**


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